Pea gravel and wood chips

[bjurbrat]

Yeah pine shavings in a run 10x16 that is only half roofed is probably not going to work unfortunately it would be a mess. Inside the coop I plan to start off with the pine shavings and unless I find a huge downside to them I will continue to use the pine.

The portion that is not roofed I plan to do a few of these grazing boxes with half inch hardware cloth and then a path between them so it wont need to be all wood chips but still a lot of ground.

Looks so nice

 

[Flockincrazy]

We are getting ready to wrap things up for a run. I keep reading about wood chips getting moldy and mushy if they haven't been aged or what not. Would it be wise to put down a couple inches of pea gravel and then 4 or 5 inches of wood chips? Pea gravel to help with getting rain and moisture away from the wood chips? Half the run will be roofed over.

Thanks for the input!

I have a layer of sand and a layer of mulch (uncolored) in my yard

 

[rosemarythyme]

I keep reading about wood chips getting moldy and mushy if they haven't been aged or what not. Would it be wise to put down a couple inches of pea gravel and then 4 or 5 inches of wood chips? Pea gravel to help with getting rain and moisture away from the wood chips? Half the run will be roofed over.

Here's the question: are you doing deep litter or just a thick layer of wood chips? If deep litter, I would not add gravel or sand or any other non-organic matter over the soil.

If you need drainage, you'll need to add drains or trench to divert water. My run is unroofed and I get a lot of rain, but I have excellent soil drainage, so the deep litter is ideal for me to get continued good drainage while stabilizing the soil and composting down the poop, reducing smells.

Wood chips do not get mushy from not being aged. The recommendation for aging is due to the fact that fresh chips can in rare cases get deadly mold blooms.

Pine shavings

Wood shavings =/= wood chips. Massive difference in how they behave especially for a deep litter set up. Shavings do not allow for the drainage and aeration that chips do.

 

[amk122284]

Here's the question: are you doing deep litter or just a thick layer of wood chips? If deep litter, I would not add gravel or sand or any other non-organic matter over the soil.

If you need drainage, you'll need to add drains or trench to divert water. My run is unroofed and I get a lot of rain, but I have excellent soil drainage, so the deep litter is ideal for me to get continued good drainage while stabilizing the soil and composting down the poop, reducing smells.

Wood chips do not get mushy from not being aged. The recommendation for aging is due to the fact that fresh chips can in rare cases get deadly mold blooms.



Wood shavings =/= wood chips. Massive difference in how they behave especially for a deep litter set up. Shavings do not allow for the drainage and aeration that chips do.

I *thought* deep litter was more of a pine shavings in the actual coop? I would LOVE to do a deep litter of some sort if it's possible, I have just associated deep litter with pine shavings and know that pine shavings will definitely not work in an outdoor open run. How do you do your deep litter outside, do you do it with wood chips? What's your process? Drainage isnt really an issue for the area where the run is going, there was some puddling at one point but I had my father in law bring the tractor down and he added a bunch of dirt and built the run area up. I'm just worried about our springs when we wont see sunshine or a dry sky for a week straight and the ground literally has no time to even recover which is pretty common in the spring.

 

[bjurbrat]

Here's the question: are you doing deep litter or just a thick layer of wood chips? If deep litter, I would not add gravel or sand or any other non-organic matter over the soil.

If you need drainage, you'll need to add drains or trench to divert water. My run is unroofed and I get a lot of rain, but I have excellent soil drainage, so the deep litter is ideal for me to get continued good drainage while stabilizing the soil and composting down the poop, reducing smells.

Wood chips do not get mushy from not being aged. The recommendation for aging is due to the fact that fresh chips can in rare cases get deadly mold blooms.



Wood shavings =/= wood chips. Massive difference in how they behave especially for a deep litter set up. Shavings do not allow for the drainage and aeration that chips do.

My run isn't roof either I just use wood chips in their coop my pen has grass and dirty for them to dust but I do free range and the sprinkler takes care of the poo ❤

 

[bjurbrat]

My run isn't roof either I just use wood chips in their coop my pen has grass and dirty for them to dust but I do free range and the sprinkler takes care of the poo ❤

You could use sod on part keep it watered they would love that

 

[amk122284]

My run isn't roof either I just use wood chips in their coop my pen has grass and dirty for them to dust but I do free range and the sprinkler takes care of the poo ❤

I'm worried they will destroy all the grass in the run, which is why I plan to build grazing boxes to hopefully keep fresh greens in their run. We will soon have 1/4 acre fenced in as well but that area will not be predator proof....we have hawks in the area that have taken out neighbors chickens....so they wont be able to fully free range. It will only be supervised free range which will be daily since we are outside a lot but it wont be all the time.

 

[rosemarythyme]

I *thought* deep litter was more of a pine shavings in the actual coop? I would LOVE to do a deep litter of some sort if it's possible, I have just associated deep litter with pine shavings and know that pine shavings will definitely not work in an outdoor open run. How do you do your deep litter outside, do you do it with wood chips? What's your process?

A bunch of pine shavings in a coop is deep bedding.

Deep litter (well, true deep litter) is a composting system. Most of us that do deep litter do a semi deep litter which isn't meant to compost down completely, but the poop composts in while the wood chips provide aeration and drainage.

I have a pile of aged chunky wood chips which are the main component. I layered thin layers of chips until the old mud issue stabilized, then added whatever else happened to be on hand. In fall it's a lot of dried leaves. In spring, lots of dried grass clippings. End of summer, trimmings from spent vegetable plants. Pine needles, clumps of weeds, whatever I have I toss in there.

At this point it's very stable so I no longer actively try to build it up. Any chips being added to the run were first used in the coop, and simply raked from coop to run to serve double duty. For me at least it makes for a very low effort, low cost way to manage mud and odor, and the chickens enjoy digging through the litter as well.

 

[bjurbrat]

I'm worried they will destroy all the grass in the run, which is why I plan to build grazing boxes to hopefully keep fresh greens in their run. We will soon have 1/4 acre fenced in as well but that area will not be predator proof....we have hawks in the area that have taken out neighbors chickens....so they wont be able to fully free range. It will only be supervised free range which will be daily since we are outside a lot but it wont be all the time.

I only have 7 chickens so they don't tear up the grass I do though have dirt for them to scratch around and I dig worms for them every day they get yogurt with apples or some kind of fruit we do have hawks but I guess that the price of being free ❣

 

[3KillerBs]

Just as with a compost pile, a deep litter system benefits from having a mix of materials -- sizes and textures -- to keep it from packing down and matting.

I used wood chips, pine shavings, pine straw, straw, fall leaves, and whatever other "compost browns" came to hand -- adding another layer every few weeks and cleaning it out whenever the pile got inconveniently tall, whenever I developed an odor problem that couldn't be solved by adding another 4-6" layer of bedding, or whenever I wanted compost for the garden.

Pine shavings work just fine, being unlikely to pack and mat like straw, but they break down faster than wood chips -- turning into beautiful, garden-enriching compost. You'll get the best results by mixing sizes, textures, and material composition because that creates the best environment for the good bacteria and fungi that make for a healthy system.

A few handfuls of scratch tossed into the bedding encourages the chickens to keep it stirred up but you might have to use a fork now and then to break up any packed or crusty areas regardless of the materials you used.